ATO Warns That Filing Early Increases Risk of Mistakes

The Australian Tax Office (ATO) wants taxpayers to be aware that filing their tax returns early may not be the best option. While you can begin filing returns as early as 1 July, you run the risk of making mistakes as not all required information will have been pre-filled at…

ATO Advice for Lodging Cryptocurrency Losses

With the recent downturn in the cryptocurrency market, there is likely to be a good number of investors that will be reporting losses. The Australian Tax Office (ATO) is however flagging this as an issue of concern that investors need to be more careful about at tax time. According to…

Accounting Professionals to Temper Salary Increment Expectations

The 2022-2023 Hays Salary Guide has shown that the accounting and finance sector is facing increased competition for skilled professionals. This is a problem many other industries are facing and has led to unemployment dropping to just 3.9% this year. It is expected to drop further to 3.5% in 2023,…

ATO Warns Taxpayers Against Double Dipping

The Australian Tax Office (ATO) has confirmed that in 2021, about 8.4 million Australian taxpayers filed claims on almost $19.8 billion in work-related expenses. Assistant Commissioner, Tim Loh, noted that these were a lot of deductions and that the tax body wanted to ensure taxpayers got their claims right the…

ATO to Resume Recovery of Debts on Hold

The Australian Tax Office (ATO) has informed tax professionals that their clients will begin receiving notification letters on any outstanding aged debt beginning May 2022. Aged debt, or debts on hold, are uneconomic non-pursued debts that are not visible on the balance of taxpayers’ accounts as they have been classified…

ATO Issues Reminder on FBT Obligations

The Australian Tax Office (ATO) is reminding employers that they may have fringe benefits tax (FBT) obligations that they need to file for before the deadline which falls on 23 May 2022 for those lodging their own returns or lodging paper returns. The deadline for returns being lodged using registered…

IPA Criticizes ATO On New 100A Guidelines

The Australian Tax Office (ATO) released draft documents concerning the tax treatment of trusts. These guidelines provide recommendations as to how section 100A under the Income Tax Assessment Act of 1936 should be applied in regards to trust stripping arrangements. A key focus of the documents is where distributions are…

Directors Targeted In ATO Debt Collection Drive

Seen as a sign that the government is now ending its soft approach to tax debt since the pandemic started, the Australian Tax Office (ATO) announced earlier this year that they would be contacting company directors via letter concerning their potential liability for company tax debts. Since then, over 50,000…

Accountants Put On Notice Over LMITO Changes

As part of the pre-election budget reading on 29 March 2022, the government declared plans to boost the low and middle-income tax offset (LMITO) by an additional $420. Prior to this, the cost of living offset amount was $1,080. This brings the new total to $1,500 for individuals and $3,000…

Do Australian Small Businesses Lag In Digital Adoption?

A recent business survey conducted by CPA Australia has found that the Australian small business sector is lagging behind that of its peers in other Asia Pacific nations. The 13th annual Asia-Pacific small business survey collected data from 11 economies and found that despite the sluggish performance recorded by businesses…